Technical textiles are a specialized textile product used primarily for their function rather than for their aesthetic purposes. Some of the functions of the technical textiles are EMI shielding, water-proofing, fire and flame resistance, antistatic function, antimicrobial function, fire-resistance, and anti-odor function. The clothing made from the technical textiles is commonly referred to as protective clothing, which is used for various applications. For example, the protective clothing with an antistatic property or characteristic is used by the operators of a gas station, firefighters, and the like, as such clothing prevents the accumulation of electric charges on the surface thereof. Protective clothing with antimicrobial function is another product of technical textiles which helps in preventing the cross-transmission of infectious diseases, and is therefore used in hospitals, medical laboratories, and so on. Yet another example would be fire-resistant clothing typically worn by firefighters while performing firefighting operations.
In spite of various types of protective clothing known in the prior art, there's still a need for technical textiles that exhibit more than one function. For example, a protective clothing used in medical facilities might need to be water-proof while being anti-microbial. Similarly, another example would be a sportswear which needs to have an anti-odor function while exhibiting an anti-UV property. Several attempts have been made in the art to address the need for multifunctional technical textiles, however, the multifunctional textiles made out of these attempts comprises more than one layer of cloth and is therefore bulky and heavy causing inconvenience to the wearer. Therefore, there exists a need for a multifunctional technical textile which is light and single or uni-layered.
Further, the technical textiles are typically manufactured by a multi-stage wet process which consumes a lot of time. And on top of that, these wet processes are not eco-friendly as they produce a lot of wastewater which is hazardous to the environment. Hence, it is desirable to manufacture light, single-layered, multifunctional technical textiles from a dry, quick, eco-friendly method.